European spatial planning between competitiveness and territorial cohesion: shadows of neoliberalism

This paper analyses the use of the concept of territorial cohesion in policy documents produced by the European Union. It is an idea celebrated in community documents, such as cohesion reports, the Territorial Agenda of the European Union (2007) and the Green Paper on Territorial Cohesion (2008); after more than a decade of political debate, the concept is about to gain a legitimate institutional role, after being included in the Lisbon Treaty (2007), and is among the competences that the EU shares with other member states. At first, territorial cohesion seems to oppose the logics of neo-liberalism by re-inscribing welfare problems and policies in spatial terms. However, using the analytical framework of cultural critics, and intending cohesion to be a discourse carried on by a community of European scholars and policy makers, the research will discuss the conceptual relationship between competitiveness and territorial cohesion in European policies and narratives.